What I'm watching with Barry Chase of Fairhaven

What he's watching: "Ghost Hunters," Sci-Fi, Discovery and History channels

Do the dead walk among us?

That's what the cast of one of the TV shows Barry Chase watches — Sci-Fi channel's docu-soap "Ghost Hunters" — is trying to find out.

While Mr. Chase mostly watches the History and Discovery channels and other Sci-Fi network fare, this show he finds an interesting change of pace.

"It's something different," he says of what originally caught his attention. "And it's not hyped. They don't bring in a medium or anything, and no one goes into a trance," he says of the show's reliance on everyday folks to aid in the search for answers.

In fact, the main ghost hunters are actually two plumbers who lead TAPS, The Atlantic Paranormal Society. They travel around the country visiting houses with strange noises and generally hard-to-explain happenings to determine if they really are haunted.

Among the cast is New Bedford native Steve Gonsalves, technical manager for the ghost hunters.

Mr. Chase recalls one episode of the show in which a chair seemed to move by itself. But he's a bit skeptical about whether it was a ghost who did the moving.

For work, "I go into a lot of old houses by myself and I've never seen anything," he says, adding that unless he sees something first hand, he's not likely to believe it.

In fact, his own business leaves him with a more practical perspective about those noises investigated on the show.

"I'm in the pest-control business, so I think it could be mice in the attic or a squirrel," he says.